Dear Friends, Hundreds and hundreds of emails have been in my inbox for which I thank everyone. Right now we are spending the time with our church friends, the Howards, and since John works from home he has connected me to his wireless so I can work as well. Polly is in their ktichen trying to save our food from the freezer and refrigerator...cooking it and freezing it. Schools are still closed here until Wed.

This morning was the first time anyone was let into our mobile ranch park. John and Linda went with us as they were not sure our emotions would be able to deal with what we saw. Our home was the first in a line of seven that we were saved. Our pastor came by and said a volunteer fireman had told him at church yesterday that they made their stand at our home as I had three connected hoses for water (and he admitted they ate a few oranges). It was clear from our home that a stand had been made there. No way we can ever thank those wonderful firemen. The bigger units were in the fires nearer San Diego and so the volunteer groups were in our park,

Long story short we have no power, gas, or water (we have water but they tell us not to even touch it as it might be contaminated). Thus we have no way to stay in our home. The Howards helped us gather some clothes to wash, clean up the fridge and the freezer and pack their Yukon with everything we needed. Since we can get back, we will try to go back each day and do a little work. The National Guard are guarding the park and you cannot get in without a proof of residence.

The scene at our home is that all the roses, shrubbery, and two trees in front of our house are fairly scorched. The passion fruit vine that was crawling up a trellis in our front is completed burned. Our front picture window is broken, probably from heat. However, we have no ash in the house and just a faint smell of smoke. The back yard is kind of a mess and our pond is still alive with fish...but they need some aeration soon. Being Mr. Organization, seeing everything thrown every which way is hard on me. Since the houses across the street are burned, this is truly a miracle.

Friday we were not allowed in so we just drove into San Diego amidst the smoke, got on a plane to MN. Our grandsons did not figure out until yesterday when we left that we planned to come purely to see their band performance. They were so happy to see us on Friday they just hugged us. We spent all of Sat at the Metrodome watching some of the finest kids around do some amazing band performances in the MN State marching band competition and the Upper Midwest championship. Rosemount has a spectacular performance (of course) and won the MN title, the Upper Midwest title and the week before had won third in the entire Midwest. So though we felt like refugees at some level, being with our family, helped so mucn.

Last night our wonderful AFS friends, Ted and Mollie Thomas put us up on Carlsbad and offered their home as long as we needed it. Again, it was respite with people we care about that helped us. A young man in the security line at the airport offered us a place to stay in his home in Hanford, CA, quite a miles north...he even gave us his business card. We have had four offers from strangers to stay with them.

Now that the initial shock is off, we just wait and go each day and get a few things done to make our house habitable again. We understand that our Pastor Mike gave a totally moving sermon yesterday that we will listen to. He came into our kitchen today while we were clearing the fridge and gave us a all a big hug. Four families in our church lost their homes and many more are evacuated like we.

I do not have a phone right now, but I will be working on email. If anyone has SKYPE, I am available that way. I will be doing the sending report in an hour or so.

Again, thank you so much for your concern. Justin, Troy, and Stefan are carrying on for me and can handle most things that I have no access to right now. We are emotionally drained, but honestly, looking at what we saw today is not something we would like to do again. Our neighbor Gisele (she is from Germany) lost her home She said this looked exactly how it looked when she fled Germany after an air attack. Her comment, " These are just things. I can replace them. I still have my family and my friends."

Our daughter-in-law just called and our grandkids (oldest 9) put up a lemonade stand with a sign that says, 'Help for Fallbrook Fire" and have already made $25. Now they are going to bake brownies to sell.. Zach Mulert, a returnee and teacher at La Jolla Country Day, wrote me an email this morning stating since his students knew me from presenting there that they would be able to relate to Fallbrook and could do something financially and physically to help.

This too will pass...for us we have credit cards we can pay off and people to help us. Our hearts go out to those who have nothing to fall back on.